Go to
work," Aimee Hurt calls. It's a cool August afternoon in Montana's
Blackfoot Valley. Dressed in an orange vest and bear bells, Wicket
begins sweeping across the trail, running in wide arcs, jumping
downed trees, traveling with her nose high, mouth wide open. We
follow the 3-year-old Lab cross through a recently logged patch of
woods at the base of the Scapegoat Wilderness.

Wicket
narrows in on an area, becomes more focused, tail wagging
furiously. Suddenly, she stops, sits down and stares at her
handler. Hurt walks over to investigate her find. "Good girl!" she
yells, and tosses Wicket her favorite toy. "It could be grizzly,"
Hurt says, pulling out a bag to collect the sample for analysis.
Some dogs lead the blind, others sniff out drugs or explosives.
Wicket's specialty is poop: grizzly, black bear, cougar and wolf. A
specially trained scat-detection dog, Wicket is conducting science
in a whole new way. She and a growing team of dogs like her are
making significant contributions to conservation efforts in the
West and around the globe.

With the DNA extracted from
the scat Wicket finds, scientists can identify species and sex, and
potentially determine population size, home range, paternity and
kinship. The analysis of endocrine extracted from scat can even
determine the reproductive status of the animals.

Armed
with hundreds of millions of scent-sensitive cells, compared to the
dismal few hundred possessed by humans, dogs are ideal for
scat-detection work. But not all dogs are employable. As Megan
Parker, co-founder of Working Dogs for Conservation Foundation
(WDCF), points out, "Most people would describe these dogs as
psycho."

Hurt, also a co-founder of WDCF, came across
Wicket at Pintler Pets, a shelter in Anaconda, Mont., when the pup
was just 12 months old. An employee contacted her about a different
dog, but that mildly playful mutt lacked the off-the-charts energy
and drive necessary for a scat-dog's line of work. A stroll through
the kennel led Hurt to Wicket, who was bouncing off the walls,
completely ball-obsessed. "When I described to the shelter worker
which dog I wanted to take for a try-out, she said, 'That one's
crazy,' " says Hurt. "Turned out to be the right kind of crazy."
Wicket had been passed over for the last six months, but her day
had finally come.

After just nine
weeks of intensive training, Wicket went to work. Now, she is in
her third season on the Wildlife Conservation Society's Centennial
Carnivore Connectivity Project, an attempt to determine the habitat
selection and movement patterns of the four critical carnivore
species whose scat are Wicket's specialty. The Centennials serve as
a migratory corridor between the Yellowstone area and central
Idaho's Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness. Connecting
these two areas is essential for preventing genetic isolation of
these species.

This fall, Wicket will begin work for the
Missoula, Mont.-based Rocky Mountain Research Station. She'll be
part of an ongoing study of the elusive fisher. Fishers - a
relative of the weasel - are rare in the Rocky Mountains; they have
been found only in north-central Idaho and west-central Montana.
Researchers plan to employ a variety of survey methods - including
Wicket's skills - to learn more about how and why this carnivore is
so rare in this area.

Wicket's work is deeply important
to her human handlers and to all the scientists who use the data
she uncovers. But for Wicket herself, it's all about a romp through
the woods for a few minutes of ball time, her coveted reward for a
successful find.

When not on the job, Wicket spends her
downtime obsessing over the hose. She sits by the spigot in her
yard, eagerly waiting for some sucker to turn it on so she can
chase the stream. According to Hurt, "She'll wait quietly, but
shiver with anticipation while we water the garden before her
turn."

More from Wildlife

This is a wonderful story. The Endangered Wildlife
Trust in South Africa also uses dogs to detect predators - they
have a great blog about these working dogs
http://limpopocarnivores.wildlifedirect.org while the Cheetah
Conservation Trust use dogs to protect livestock against cheetah,
thus reducing conflict with cheetah and their eventual
persecution.